Annual Game Music Awards 2018 Nominations

The team at VGMO: Video Game Music Online are proud to present the nominations for the Annual Game Music Awards 2018. These panel-voted, officially-recognized awards provide a thorough and wide-reaching recognition of achievement in game music over the last year.

A panel of experienced and knowledgeable journalists have determined the nominations of these awards. The panelists have selected their choices by carefully considering the merit of the game music created this year — as art and entertainment, as part of in-game experiences and as part of stand-alone albums. All game music first released between January 1, 2018 and December 31, 2018 was eligible for consideration. Games that were first released in Japan before January 1, 2018, but have since been localized were only eligible in the “Best Western Localization” category.

The seventh awards ceremony of this kind, the AGMAs are intended to celebrate achievement across the game audio industry and give recognition to the incredibly creative people working in it. While ‘best music’ and ‘best sound’ categories are featured in other video game awards, the majority of these awards only commemorate top-selling video games and overlook other often-excellent productions (e.g., import and indie soundtracks). The winners will be announced in early February.

Editor’s Note: In addition to the returning categories of “Fan Favorite” and “Writer’s Choice”, we also have introduced “Best Instrumental Theme” this year that include some of our favorite individual pieces of the year that are not featured in other categories.

4.3. Fan-Arranged Album Disclaimer: While some of our writers are involved in the fan remix community, those writers are not involved in the nomination or voting in this category.

Additionally, Stardew Valley Piano Collections was originally one of the nominees for 4.3; however, since it is an official arrange album, we have moved it to the appropriate category and replaced it with a sixth nomination. No nominees have been removed from the list.

Organizations of the Year

5.2. Record LabelDisclaimer: Once again, while some of our writers have worked with record labels we considered or nominated, those writers are not involved in the nomination or voting in this category.
Basiscape Records
From Software
Harmonics Music
Ship-to-Shore Phono Co.
Sleigh Bells/ Procyon Studio

5.3. Organisation of the Year 2018To be selected from pool of winners in above categories

Posted on January 10, 2019 by Don Kotowski. Last modified on January 11, 2019.

About the Author

Don Kotowski Currently residing in Philadelphia. I spend my days working in vaccine characterization and dedicate some of my spare time in the evening to the vast world of video game music, both reviewing soundtracks as well as maintaining relationships with composers overseas in Europe and in Japan.